


the fault lines in the human heart

by mercuryhatter



Category: Machineries of Empire Series - Yoon Ha Lee
Genre: F/F, Gen, Major Character Undeath, Roleswap, whats the opposite of major character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 09:48:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14913099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercuryhatter/pseuds/mercuryhatter
Summary: what good is immortality if nothing has been done to repair the fault lines in the human heart?Istradez gives Mikodez a curse in the shape of self-preservation.





	the fault lines in the human heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [venndaai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/venndaai/gifts).



> This is part of a roleswap AU developed by myself and @venndaai, the premise being that Istradez became the Shuos Hexarch and Mikodez her double. Jedao and Cheris are swapped as well, which is not relevant to this story except to understand why it’s Cheris’s stuff on display instead of Jedao’s.

The room was uniquely Kel for the Shuos headquarters, dazzling gold on sucking-void black, the decor all arranged around the focal point of General Kel Cheris’s calendrical sword. If you didn’t know its history the sword might appear defective, with the numbers on its blade quivering and changing in a headache-inducing strobe. Nirai Kujen was undoubtedly jealous that Istradez possessed it instead of him-- it was a fascinating study on what became of a calendrical sword when its owner became a revenant-- but Istradez’s agents had defended it effectively against theft over the years. 

 

Istradez was not looking forward to the conversation she was about to have. She hated to lie to her sister, and there were many ways in which Mikodez did not deserve what was about to happen to her. Istradez had played all of them out in her head, trying to dissuade herself, but in the end nothing she could come up with held up against the idea of life without Mikodez. If the price was living with her own selfishness, it was one she could accept. Mikodez could survive a life alone. Istradez could not. 

 

“Hoping it’ll show you something new?” Mikodez asked. She was almost entirely herself, hair down and unadorned, wearing a deep bottle-green robe that was wrinkled as if it had been recently slept in, or picked up off the floor. Either was likely. Istradez herself was in no place to judge at the moment-- she’d done her hair, but messily, she’d been wearing the same clothes since the previous day, and her makeup had smudged into the sleepless hollows under her eyes. She twisted a ring on one of her fingers around and around, almost certainly a habit picked up from Mikodez. When this thought occurred to her, she made herself stop. 

 

“It’s always showing me something new, but don’t ask me to interpret what,” Istradez said wryly. Mikodez smiled, insinuating herself between Istradez and the sword’s case to lean against the glass. She rubbed Istradez’s upper arms and Istradez relaxed very slightly into the touch. 

 

“Have you considered my advice about the hexarchs?” Mikodez asked after several moments of silence. Istradez stepped out of Mikodez’s grasp. She wanted to turn away-- Mikodez wasn't meeting her eyes, because if left to her own devices Mikodez wasn't big on eye contact, but she was still  _ looking _ at Istradez, without even knowing how Istradez’s resolve was being tested. But she had to proceed. The decision was made. 

 

“I have, but it hasn't changed my mind,” she said. Mikodez immediately opened her mouth, but Istradez held up a silencing hand, and Mikodez reluctantly closed it. Istradez did turn away then, on the guise of walking around the sword display, trailing a hand over the glass. 

 

“I don't know how many times I have to remind you that I am hexarch,” she said, and through the tired hoarseness of her voice her tone was fond. But Mikodez didn't relax the way she’d hoped, and she even saw a flash of anger in her sister’s face from the corner of her eye. She ignored it. She did not expect Mikodez to dart around the display, and expected even less for Mikodez to fall to her knees in front of her, head bowed, hands balled up in the fabric of her robe to keep them still. 

 

“I  _ know _ you are hexarch,” Mikodez said fervently, and the formal mode of  _ hexarch _ made Istradez’s heart quiver with shock. “That is why I have to preserve you-- as if loving you wasn't enough. So I am begging you to  _ listen _ to me. Let me take them out. Don't miss this opportunity just to keep me. This is bigger than me. And I can do it,” she finished, almost defensively. “Let me do it.” 

 

So unexpected that it almost  _ worked. _

 

Istradez fell to her knees-- something literal to the word  _ fell,  _ she could feel the impact blooming bruises on her joints-- and took Mikodez’s face between her hands, holding her harder than she needed to. She let her anguish play across her face; it was too pronounced for Mikodez to miss, so trying to hide it was pointless. She could only hope it would be misinterpreted until it was too late. 

 

“I know you can do it,” she said fiercely. “I have never doubted you, Mikodez. I--” She cut herself off, felt her nails digging into Mikodez’s face, forced her hands to fall. She imagined living another fifty years without Mikodez, imagined trying to run the Shuos through her grief, imagined looking at her sister’s corpse in the mirror every day for the rest of her life.  _ No.  _

 

She already knew she was going to have to lie. The substance of the lie was immaterial, and if she allowed Mikodez to keep arguing with her, the risk was too great that she would eventually give in. 

 

“All right,” she said, the words tearing her throat, but not for the reasons Mikodez must think. this time it was Mikodez who took Istradez’s face in her hands, but so gently, almost too gently to be borne. It took all Istradez had not to throw her off. 

 

“Thank you, Hexarch,” Mikodez whispered, formal mode still, and Istradez allowed herself to shatter, because now it could only further the fiction. 

 

“Stop,” she snapped, tears oozing through Mikodez’s fingers, “if you call me that again I'll take everything back. Miki--” She fell bonelessly against Mikodez’s chest, let her catch and comfort her, and that, she thought later, was probably the filthiest lie of them all. 

 

Still, she sent Mikodez off with a defective bomb and tampered meds and every other safeguard she could think of against Mikodez’s plan succeeding, sealing the ship’s controls against her and instructing the other agents to make sure she made it to the meeting at all costs. Then she locked herself in her room, refused every message, and waited for the fruits of her betrayal to return to her. 

 

\---

 

It was three days after Mikodez left, and Istradez had finally been dragged into sleep for the first time since then by her uncooperative body. She’d heard about Cheris’s attack on the Aerie, but nothing about the other hexarchs all dying in a mysterious explosion, so she could only assume her plan had worked. She hadn’t considered when she made this decision that Mikodez might, of her own volition, just never return. An oversight, and one that would be unforgivable if she truly never saw Mikodez again. So when Mikodez broke into her room, some hours after she’d passed into unconsciousness, she thought for a moment that she was dreaming, until Mikodez struck her hard across the face. 

 

Istradez sat up, swaying groggily but tensed for a fight, until her eyes cleared enough to see her own face before her, twisted in anger. Mikodez’s hand was frozen in the air, as if she wanted to hit Istradez again, but for now she refrained. She was shaking, her pupils dilated so that they almost swallowed the irises, and the sclera around them was shot through with red. Istradez wondered how many drugs Mikodez was on, and wished she was on some herself. 

 

“Miki, I’m sorry,” she started, but Mikodez shook her head wordlessly. She collapsed onto the bed next to Istradez, staring at her own hands, watching them tremble. Istradez tried again. “I didn’t want to lie to you--” 

 

“How could you not know what you’ve done to me,” Mikodez said hollowly. Her tone sent a chill through Istradez. “How could you--” 

 

“I tried to tell you I disagreed with your plan--” 

 

“Fuck, Istradez, not  _ that, _ don’t be a fucking idiot,” Mikodez said, close to a whisper. “Did you think about anyone but yourself for this? Where the  _ fuck _ does this get us? And I--” Her voice broke and she curled inward, wrapping her arms around herself. “I wouldn’t have believed you capable. Not of this.” 

 

It was too much for Istradez’s sleep-addled brain to work through what Mikodez, her newly-immortal sister, meant. 


End file.
